Those new idols are just variants of the main idols.There is a short sex hair Azusa.A gray Makoto.Haruka with just one ribbon and more srs face.And that short haired miki....At least they are not touhous this time like CG.

Those new idols are just variants of the main idols.There is a short sex hair Azusa.A gray Makoto.Haruka with just one ribbon and more srs face.And that short haired miki....At least they are not touhous this time like CG.

I'll give you the Azusa (though I still think she's adorable X3) and the Haruka, though the "gray Makoto" is more like "gray, juggling Eri" And the short-haired Miki seems slightly more tomboyish and less lazy. Also, one of the new Visual girls looks like Karen from Harvest moon. Still, I think we'll be out of this kind of thinking in a while; when we got Hibiki, people kept comparing her to Miki and Futami-tachi, while Takane got a lot of comparison to Azusa. Also, Ai to Haruka(which I would not say now, though a Yayoi comparison would be well warrented). Not sure if Eri and Ryou got the same comparison...

But I'm the kind of person who is always excited about new characters. Sometimes cautiously optimistic, like now; I'm slightly less cautious because CGirls have too many fans now for these newbies to change their minds too drastically.

EDIT:

After looking at the PV again, I've noticed that we get a- although brief and colorless- look at more idols, when they're showing the concept art. A girl with a short ponytail who matches the sillouette from the Dance category who looks kinda spunky and flirty, a girl with short hair in a shape from the Vocal category who looks kinda nervous but adorable, a girl with long and partially braided hair who looks serene and may be from Vocal, and a long-haired but generic girl with a headband who might be from Visual. (Hedgebet on Vocal)

I wonder if there's an enforced unit-count, like in CG (or what I've seen of CG gameplay..) It seems like it might be 3 idols, but then the idol "fight" scene looks kinda odd with 9 cards attacking Ami, Yayoi and Azusa. (Including another Ami. XD) Also, the "Commu" sections imply, at least to me, that Solo idol might be an option. Perhaps there will be advantages and disadvantages to having a single idol and to having multiple idols. (Which would be cool.) Maybe even a Quintet, like in CG and (some parts of) 2? Just spouting off random ideas...

I don't know if anybody here has played games on Gree before, but I did up until everything I was playing became "unavailable in my region". I'm not sure if we're going to need a location spoofer for this or not.

I don't know if anybody here has played games on Gree before, but I did up until everything I was playing became "unavailable in my region". I'm not sure if we're going to need a location spoofer for this or not.

Might have to run your browser through a proxy? There's stuff for that too.

Fuuka is totally Azusa 2.0. If she ever made an appearance in the main series, I'd love to see interaction between them. She's Azusa's long-lost twin. XDSpeaking of the main series, somehow I could picture the Million Live girls in an actual main iDOLM@STER game more than the CG girls. Even if some of them look similar to existing characters, they seem as if they were made with that intent. Not that I'd mind...

according to one of my friends on tumblr, 2ch ripped the following image from Idolm@ster 2 a few months agoAt the time it was assumed she was beta Eri but nowEDIT: I got curious and examined the silhouettes some more, and the girl in the corner looks a lot like this one from the visual category.

according to one of my friends on tumblr, 2ch ripped the following image from Idolm@ster 2 a few months agoAt the time it was assumed she was beta Eri but nowEDIT: I got curious and examined the silhouettes some more, and the girl in the corner looks a lot like this one from the visual category.

Well, this could be like the Prototype thing with Takane and Hibiki, since the idol in the picture has a different eye color than the idol that is just revealed.

Huh. I'm still really liking the new designs. I think it also highlights my biggest problem with many CGirl designs; they're too one-note, too focused on a "concept." In some cases it works, like with Ranko, where she is a chuunibyou who has trouble being honest even with herself. In some cases it doesn't, like with Anzu, who has annoyed me since day 1, or like with Miku or Nana. (Also, I really like Kirari, but that's more because tall girls are cute~) In some cases, it makes the girls with less focus look "generic" or seem like they have undefinable personalities, which is in part because there's only so much that can be shown, personality-wise, in two cards and ten-ish lines of dialogue. It can be done well and leave a well-rounded character- I think a good example is Rin, who was somewhat popular since day 1, but also Mika and Rika, who are sociable, but with hidden depths, and whose garu-culture-ness doesn't take over their entire being.

Here, they're trying to make characters they'd seriously infuse into the games, who would stand out in-universe as an idol, but not stand out out-of-universe where she would seem too fantastical in the surprisingly-grounded iMAS universe. (Even if ribbon-girl reminds me disturbingly of Mayu...) Granted, people still think Takane's from the moon, and Hibiki talks to and understands animals (in the anime only, last time I checked, and it was the only thing I didn't like), and Chihaya[spoiler]'s dead brother speaks to producer[/spoiler] but these stand out because the rest of the imas world is well-rooted in the mundane. (Plus, Takane's probably not from the moon and Hibiki's wildspeak is anime- and possibly episode-exclusive, practically speaking.)